A little while ago I ripped out Slot 1 PIII CPU and replaced it with a Core2 E7400. Well, I had to replace a few other parts too. Wanting put the new hardware to good use, I loaded the Windows folding at home program. With no special effort I am generating 400 or so points per day. Eager to increase my points per day I loaded the F@H client on my Vostro 1500 laptop.

Q 1) I read that the Linux version gets more points per day, is that really true and if so... 1a) What is a good Linux distro that is an XP look-a-like so the wife can surf the web. The E7400 does not have VM so I do not think I have the option of running Linux in a VM window.

Q 2) The laptop is only showing 50% CPU usage even with the slider at 100%. The laptop is running Vista. How do I improve that.

Q 3) What does a 10,000 point per day set-up look like? Is it hard to do?

Dagwood wrote:A little while ago I ripped out Slot 1 PIII CPU and replaced it with a Core2 E7400. Well, I had to replace a few other parts too. Wanting put the new hardware to good use, I loaded the Windows folding at home program. With no special effort I am generating 400 or so points per day.

This seems like you are running the single core client on the E7400. You should use the SMP client instead. More on that later.

Dagwood wrote:Eager to increase my points per day I loaded the F@H client on my Vostro 1500 laptop.

Make sure you have good ventilation around the laptop as the more cramped design is not necessary good to handle Folding.

Dagwood wrote:Q 1) I read that the Linux version gets more points per day, is that really true and if so... 1a) What is a good Linux distro that is an XP look-a-like so the wife can surf the web. The E7400 does not have VM so I do not think I have the option of running Linux in a VM window.

For the SMP client, yes, the Linux version seems to do a little bit better (the gap has shrunken but it is still there), but for the Linux version, it is only available in 64-bit only. Intel CPUs cannot do 64-bit VMs (guest OS) without VT, so 64-bit Linux SMP goodness is not available to you. IMO, to balance between respectable CPU folding and the wife being comfortable, stick with Windows SMP. You missed the download link at the bottom of the regular download page about High Performance Windows Clients. Go and grab the "V6 Beta SMP/CPU clients" if you want to do CPU folding, but that is not necessary "the best". Even more on that later.

Dagwood wrote:Q 2) The laptop is only showing 50% CPU usage even with the slider at 100%. The laptop is running Vista. How do I improve that.

Referring to above, that is because you are using a single core client, so on a dual core machine of course you are only doing 50%.

Dagwood wrote:Q 3) What does a 10,000 point per day set-up look like? Is it hard to do?

This is where the fun/money/pain lies. Mega folding nodes are achieved by GPU folding. So if you have a Nvidia 8-series and up GPU or AMD HD 3000-series and up GPU, you are eligible for GPU folding. On the same High Performance Windows Clients page, grab the appropriate "V6 GPU2" client. If you have an above average GPU like >=HD 4830 or >=8800, then a few thousand points per day on a machine is very much possible. Midrange GPUs like the 9600GT/GTS250/HD4650 may still outproduce CPU SMP clients so it may still be worth it to do GPU folding. You should probably test it out yourself to see which one gives you more points.

There are 2 problems that I can see right now with GPU folding however: heat/power consumption and GPU reliability. If you have a relatively high-powered GPU and you use it for folding, system power consumption will increase and the GPU will generate more heat compared to loading the CPU. The 2nd problem sort of relates to the first, there have been reports of more frequent failures of video cards when people fold on them (some even overclocked generating more heat). There seems to be something about cutthroat manufacturing and stressing those cards too hard. If you are concerned, then you can try folding on the GPU part time or just stick with CPU folding.

When a GPU folding client is running, it loosely takes over one of the CPU cores for data to go back and forth. So for even better results, you run a GPU folding client and then a single core client to get a few more hundred points per day. Those with tris/quads can most certainly do a GPU folding client and an SMP client. So how do you get 10k+ ppd per computer? Multiple GPUs of course. If you do have those CF/SLI boards, you can buy two or more higher-end video cards and make your Folding beast! On Vista though, you may need to play a trick to get the 2nd/3rd/4th card to play along, but it is a small price to pay compared to the thousands more points you can get. If you have the stomach (and the pocketbook) for it though.

Welcome to the team and happy folding!

The Model M is not for the faint of heart. You either like them or hate them.

Right now I've got the E7400 at stock speed and the motherboard reports that it is using 18 watts! Not sure if I believe that, but the CPU temp is 49 degrees C with the fan at 1650 rpm (with it sitting in a 78 degree room folding 24/7 ).

Translation-- no one even knows the difference.

However, installing a GTX275 with a 100% load on it sounds like it would definitely be noticed.

Dagwood wrote:Yes, FF that was it. I did not open it in Admin mode. Once I did that I got it running on the laptop. Then I wished I hadn't! The laptop fan never spun that hard even when running games.

Yes, that's why we don't generally recommend folding full time and all out (100% CPU allocated) on laptops.

Dagwood wrote:I went back to the non-beta client for the laptop. Maybe I will have it fold for Frankenbot in October. Until then I think I limit the folding on the laptop.

You mean switch back from SMP back to single core client on the laptop?

Dagwood wrote:I have not loaded the beta SMP client on the desktop yet. That whole beta-software-may-crash-thing has got me reluctant. Now, I need to get some sleep for the night shift.

Unless your system is indeed unstable (I am assuming you have not overclocked yet so everything is stock), I have never seen the Folding client's "crashes" BSOD the system, so it should be mostly ok. Generally when the beta client "dies" you just get a non-counted WU and/or you just need to delete the work files and re-download a new WU. But to each its own of course. What GPU do you currently have on your desktop system?

The Model M is not for the faint of heart. You either like them or hate them.

Dagwood wrote:Yes, FF that was it. I did not open it in Admin mode. Once I did that I got it running on the laptop. Then I wished I hadn't! The laptop fan never spun that hard even when running games.

Yes, that's why we don't generally recommend folding full time and all out (100% CPU allocated) on laptops.

It's been a while since I've run the Windows SMP client -- does it support the CPU throtting option? Running the SMP client with the CPU usage throttled back to keep the fan from spazzing out will probably still give you better production than the single-core client.

The years just pass like trains. I wave, but they don't slow down.-- Steven Wilson

Dagwood wrote:I went back to the non-beta client for the laptop. Maybe I will have it fold for Frankenbot in October. Until then I think I limit the folding on the laptop.

You mean switch back from SMP back to single core client on the laptop?

Yes

FF wrote:Unless your system is indeed unstable (I am assuming you have not overclocked yet so everything is stock), I have never seen the Folding client's "crashes" BSOD the system, so it should be mostly ok. Generally when the beta client "dies" you just get a non-counted WU and/or you just need to delete the work files and re-download a new WU. But to each its own of course. What GPU do you currently have on your desktop system?

and the 8800GTS should be an even mach for a HD4850 for games. and it comes with a nicer cooler.

While from an efficiency stand point this might be true you're still going to expect about the same point out put overall. The 8800GTS not near the HD4850 in gaming. If you really want to go with an Nvidia card there are still better options than the 8800GTS. Like a used GTX 260 or a new GTS 250.

and the 8800GTS should be an even mach for a HD4850 for games. and it comes with a nicer cooler.

While from an efficiency stand point this might be true you're still going to expect about the same point out put overall. The 8800GTS not near the HD4850 in gaming. If you really want to go with an Nvidia card there are still better options than the 8800GTS. Like a used GTX 260 or a new GTS 250.

This page would seem to disagree with you. Also note the 8800GTS listed is probably a G80 based card. The one I linked is G92 and should be at least on par with a 9800GT that produces 5K per day to the 4850's 3K.

As far as gaming goes...http://techreport.com/articles.x/15651/5 at higher resolution the 4850 is inbetween a 9800GTX+ and a 9800GT. That makes by my fuzzy math a 8800GTS close enough to a HD4850 to call them equal. Granted on adverage a HD4850 is going to be faster than a 8800GTS that is why Nvidia upped the clock speed on the 9800GTX+. However we are 5-10 frames per second difference. A fairly small price to pay for a nicer cooler and better folding performance I would say.

You're using Call of Duty 4 as an example when it is an exception. I owned a 8800GTS 512MB and I can personally tell you there were no magical properties to the heatsink.

Even then, you completely ignored my follow up sentences where I directed you to other certainly superior in every way options such as a used GTX 260 or a brand new GTS 250. A brand new GTS 250 is on sell at Newegg for $99 and some odd cents right now. The card is most certainly faster, built on a smaller manufacturing process, and will give you more folding points that you strongly desire. You can read the TR review right here that confirms all of this: http://techreport.com/articles.x/16504

With the GTS250 you have a good point. I am going to pass on that EVGA card.

In other news. I have the SMP client up and running on the desktop. Speedfan reports the same 50 degrees temp as with the single core client only the fan speed went up from 1650 rpm to 1700 rpm. I am too lazy to use the benchmark tool so I will have to wait to see what the points per day average out to be.

Dagwood wrote:With the GTS250 you have a good point. I am going to pass on that EVGA card.

In other news. I have the SMP client up and running on the desktop. Speedfan reports the same 50 degrees temp as with the single core client only the fan speed went up from 1650 rpm to 1700 rpm. I am too lazy to use the benchmark tool so I will have to wait to see what the points per day average out to be.

Hi Dagwood and welcome to Team TR! I have a 260 GTX/192 running in my main PC and it gets 5-7K ppd when running the GPU client 24/7. It does generate a good amount of heat so it is not so fun on the hot days. I don't have any overclock of the CPU or GPU. I manually set the GPU fan to run continuously above 50%.

I have not seen any ppd numbers for the 250GTS, but I imagine it will produce similar to the 260GTX with less heat generated.

A PC with 3 GPUs like the 8800GTS will produce 12-16k ppd when running 3 GPU clients 24/7.

I am still working on getting the CPU version running. I thought I had it working once, then out of force of habit, I shut the machine off, when I started it back up it complained bitterly about improper shutdown. After that, it then sent the 30% it had completed to Stanford, thanked me for my contribution to science and restarted another new batch. Then new batch then proceeded to stop at 3 percent. I think it might have had some sort of argument with windows auto update.

Now I am going to try and reinstall FAH back on the laptop, I messed that all up, I put two different versions in the same directory.

8K out of a quad core and a 9600GT -- cool, gives me something to aim for. Right now I will just be happy to fiddle with getting the SMP clients running quietly and efficiently.

When I restarted the SMP client on the desktop, it picked up from 3 percent. That was encouraging, hopefully it was just a fluke that it dropped the WU the first time. But from what I read, that is why the SMP version is called a beta.

I sure picked a good time to start folding! Ambient in town was 108 yesturday I put off getting the laptop to fold.

Dagwood wrote:8K out of a quad core and a 9600GT -- cool, gives me something to aim for. Right now I will just be happy to fiddle with getting the SMP clients running quietly and efficiently.

When I restarted the SMP client on the desktop, it picked up from 3 percent. That was encouraging, hopefully it was just a fluke that it dropped the WU the first time. But from what I read, that is why the SMP version is called a beta.

I sure picked a good time to start folding! Ambient in town was 108 yesturday I put off getting the laptop to fold.

Definitely not normal. You are taking about an hour for each percent on your E7400. My E2160 @3GHz is doing about 20 minute/%. At this rate your client's output will be 1760 / (18/.25/24) = 586.67 ppd, whereas mine on the same 2653 project is 1760 / (.3/.01/24) = ~1260 ppd. Considering the E7400 stock speed is 2.8GHz, it should not be that slow. Are you running something else eating up CPU cycles?

The Model M is not for the faint of heart. You either like them or hate them.

Definitely not normal. You are taking about an hour for each percent on your E7400. My E2160 @3GHz is doing about 20 minute/%. At this rate your client's output will be 1760 / (18/.25/24) = 586.67 ppd, whereas mine on the same 2653 project is 1760 / (.3/.01/24) = ~1260 ppd. Considering the E7400 stock speed is 2.8GHz, it should not be that slow. Are you running something else eating up CPU cycles?

Look at this:

"[15:59:48] Work type a1 not eligible for variable processors"

Does your PC have some sort of power saver feature that is implemented?